Archive reports

La Formula segreta

Submitted by redazione on Fri, 11/18/2011 - 12:13

In the sixteenth century, in Italy, mathematicians confronted each other in public duels, in front of crowds of spectators, challenging each other to solve complex problems. Win or defeat depended on the subsequent scientific and personal fortune of the two opponents. According to this tradition, Tartaglia and Cardano were vivid actors - along with Scipione dal Ferro, Ludovico Ferrari and others - of the fiercest controversy that the history of mathematics remembers.Fabio Toscano - in his mature writing style, which also does justice to the charm of direct sources - rebuild this episode of bitter rivalry and scientific progress: between Brescia, Venice, Bologna and Milan, between intellectual achievement and poverty, oaths and betrayals, cunning and ingenuity, the story of the greatest mathematical dispute of the century.

Fabio Toscano, a theoretical physicist by training, is specialized in Foundations and philosophy of Physics at the Universities of Bologna and Urbino and in Communication of Science at SISSA in Trieste. He works as science expert for press, web and television. Co-president of the association Nuova Civiltà delle Macchine, he is also a member of the scientific direction of the eponymous magazine.